The Stranger’s Among Us, Part Four

This is the fourth piece in the series “The Stranger’s Among Us.” I hope you will look online for the earlier editions as the foundations laid are critical to understanding my two concluding pieces.

This will not be the last time I write about refugee resettlement. Refugee resettlement is a complicated, multi-faceted issue. I wanted my first public writing on the subject to be tied to the out of context use of Mathew 25:35-38, biblical verses utilized by the religious left as justification for welcoming tens of thousands of Islamic Refugees, mostly from civil-war torn Syria, into our Constitutional Republic. In last week’s Edgefield Advertiser, a contributor also used the same theme “Welcoming the Stranger,” for not enforcing existing immigration laws, which predominately impacts Latin American’s. In the future, I will also write about migration issues.

This week I will address expanding the federal system with borrowed money, which ultimately is what these “charitable” movements do. I believe charity with borrowed money is unwise. Next week, I will consider that the current system has created citizens who are “Stranger’s Among Us,” and what we must do about it.

The Republic of the United States ranks # 1 in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) worldwide, coming in with 25 % of the worlds GDP http://statisticstimes.com/economy/countries-by-projected-gdp.php. Yet as a nation, we continue to borrow close to 40 cents of every dollar our Federal Government spends. When you take into consideration federal and state unfunded liabilities, the performance of our national financial stewardship is dire http://www.usdebtclock.org/.
Any member of the religious left utilizing Matthew 25:35-38 as justification for expanding any Federal program currently funded with debt, in my opinion, has not read Matthew 25 in context, and is leading us down an immoral path.

I am however grateful for the religious left’s attempt to use scripture in their desired implementation of refugee resettlement and immigration public policy, even though in this usage, the scripture is out of context and the desired goal is unconstitutional. My gratefulness is because they raise the issue of stewardship, which is what two-thirds of Matthew 25 is about. The Bible actually speaks more about money and stewardship, which is one of our republic’s fundamental challenges, than it does hell! So kudo’s to the groups harnessing Matthew 25 for Civic Discussions!

Matthew 25 highlights the need for all of us to get our financial houses in order. As it relates to the Federal Government, through which the programs being discussed would be executed, we have a long way to go to avoid the punishment described in the first two parables in Matthew 25.

I am going to close with a graph and a table which highlight federal revenue. The first graph highlights the fact that we currently have historic revenue at the Federal Level, and the second graph shows where federal revenue comes from, which dispels many myths about who is and is not paying their fair share. Our problems currently lie in spending, not revenue. In the future, I will write about The Fair Tax, which eliminates IRS loopholes which infuriates so many on both sides of the political aisle.